Freyburg

CIA director Michael Hayden recently announced that Al Queda is on the ropes, a spent force, and that the group has failed to gain traction in Iraq. Well, not so fast. A recent editorial in the Guardian points out that mass uprisings may not be what Bin Laden has in mind when he calls for jihadist revolution, and more importantly, terrorists don’t even need mass support to achieve their goals. All they need is the loyalty of a hard-core group of supporters, and they can continue their operations indefinitely. Will the leaders of those die-hards be Al Queda? Maybe not, as recent intelligence has indicated some disillusionment with Bin Laden and Zawahiri. At any rate, the last time the United States took their eye off the ball, they ended up suffering the most devastating attack in the US history, invading Afghanistan and Iraq, and basically ruining their standing in the world. For their own sake, a little more vigilance and a lot less swagger might be a good idea.

Roger Stone learned the dark art of political hatchet-jobbery from Richard Nixon and Roy Cohn, two of America’s finest villains. He’s continued with their “win at any costs” philosophy, most recently applying his vile talents to both the 2000 recount and the 2004 smear job on John Kerry. And he’s an unrepentant horndog, though interestingly his habit of frequenting Miami swinger’s clubs actually led to the downfall of former New York governor and whoremonger Elliot Spitzer. An article in the current New Yorker lays out his perfidious ways in detail, and if you want to get his personal take on the world, check out his blog. I would hope that somehow this toad is kept out of the current election, but somehow I can’t shake the feeling that Obama has been in his sights from the word go.

So says a new article in the New York Times. THe reasons cited include fatigue with an endless and pointless conflict, media running out of things to say about the war, and a government that’s more secretive than any since the Nixon administration. But you’ve got to wonder what’s wrong with a country when it’s people give a war in which 4000+ of their own soldiers and an untold number of Iraqis have died a colossal “meh.” With this kind of attitude, it’s no wonder that rising powers like China and India will soon be eating our lunch.

The Huffington Post has an interesting article up about the generational gap between elderly realists of the old Republican school and young, possibly mad neocons who are currently advising the McCain campaign. As much of a crafty scumbag as Kissinger was and is, he likely doesn’t believe in the reverse domino theories and only supports the war on terror to further his own ends. Newsweek‘s Fareed Zakaria has some more thoughts on the matter.

Vanity Fair isn’t just George Clooney covers and Oscar parties, it’s also some pretty damn fine journalism, including this article detailing the legal wranglings and outright villainy of the Bush administration as they moved to change the old rules regarding interrogation, ignored the Geneva conventions and legalized torture.

The always excellent Frontline has pulled out the stops for the fifth anniversary of the War in Iraq with a huge documentary entitled “Bush’s War,” detailing the build-up from 9/11 onwards, the initial invasion and the continued bloodshed in Iraq today. It’s long, but worth the watch. Unfortunately, PBS hasn’t quite gotten the glory that is embedding video just yet, so you’ll have to head to their page to check it out.

In an interview last week with an ABC correspondent, Dick Cheney’s response to the point that the American public doesn’t support the war in Iraq was simple…”So?” Mickey Edwards of the Washington Post, long a Cheney supporter, has had enough of this open contempt of the public interest, and he says so in the Washington Post.

America is known as one of the most innovative, entrepreneurial places on the planet…or at least it used to be. The subprime mortgage crisis, along with a shaky economy and a war that’s been a colossal money sink, have given pause to the thought that the US is the financial titan of yore, as seen in this article in Slate.

The war, now in its fifth year, will cost the United States one TRILLION dollars. Not only that, but a lot of it is borrowed money. Noted economist Joseph Stiglitz crunched the numbers, and according to the Guardian, the numbers ain’t good.

Newsweek’s Fareed Zakaria points out in his latest column that while America cowers from perceived threats, the rest of the world still sees it as an aggressive bully. In order for the US to regain its standing in the world, they’re going to have to get past their sense of fear and deal with a rapidly changing world. Zakaria suggests one bright idea might be spending less time on the Middle East and more on China and India.